Blog also known as SathyaSaiMemories ~ stories of love in action and the benefits of giving

Video

One of the cleverest videos ever posted. A British comedy “take” on kids growing up in the 1970’s. This is definitely worth a few of your precious minutes to just sigh, giggle, reflect and smile on all that was so much part of our lives back then. (You’ll be surprised how many well-loved items from that era have been almost completely forgotten. Was it a better time? in hind-sight I think so ha! – Your views on the video welcome. 🙂 –

1970s Fad’s and Fun

There were a few fads in the 1970s. Streaking was probably one of the more memorable. So popular was removing all of your clothes in a public place and running to avoid capture, that songs were written in it’s honor. Truckers enjoyed the spotlight too. Songs about their lifestyle burst onto the scenes, CB radios became popular accessories in cars, and phrases like “Keep on Trucking” and “That’s a 10-4 Good Buddy” were heard routinely. Pet Rocks, lava lamps, and waterbeds were popular while strobe lights and black lights were often found in a teenager’s room. Interior decorating often still included colors such as avocado and gold. Even appliances. Shag rugs graced many floors. Furniture upholstered with crushed velvet and mirrored walls were also common in some circles. Kids had a Spirograph to draw colorful designs, Legos to build almost anything, and other favorites like an Etch-A-Sketch or a Lite Brite set. Weebles, Easy-Bake Ovens, Creeple People, Nerf Balls, Hot Wheels (which entered the scene in the 60’s), and Slime were among other popular choices. Twister, Aggravation, Battleship, and Yahtzee were around in addition to the more traditional board games like Monopoly and Life. Rubik’s Cubes and Air Hockey sets came along and in the march toward today’s video games, Pong and early Atari games were very well received. Big Wheels were for the little ones and Banana Seat Bikes were popular with kids who were a bit older. Kids who were really lucky however got a mini-bike or moped. In the 1970s iPods were unheard of and records and tapes were the medium of music. Everyone had a clock radio and a stereo record player. Quadrophonic sound was available and many kids enjoyed their cassette recorder to capture music off of the radio. In cars, 8-track players were around but lost out to cassette decks by the end of the decade. We also didn’t have the electronic keyboards, but as kids we learned to play a chord organ which luckily required no lessons whatsoever! In the 1970’s cable TV was absent from many homes and network TV stations; ABC, CBS, and NBC were king. Microwave ovens started taking over the market. Cordless phones were just coming out, but of course cell phones were well off in the future.

those kinky boots

comments box is below.. there is a little grey circle at the top of the post with comments number.. This is where you need to click to leave a comment. Sorry about this.. Nothing to do with me! eve

(Photographers be warned: There is no other video to compare with this on you tube)

You were born with wings. Why prefer to crawl through life?

“I drank that wine of which the soul is is vessel. Its ecstasy has stolen my intellect away. A light came and kindled a flame in the depth of my soul. A light so radiant that the sun orbits around it like a butterfly.” -Rumi

photo source: Nowie

Louie Schwartzberg bio

For over three decades, the award-winning cinematographer has been creating iconic and memorable images while becoming widely known as one of the industry’s most innovative cinematographers. Schwartzberg’s work in the areas of time-lapse photography, nature, aerial and “slice-of-life” photography are recognized around the world. Schwartzberg has been the recipient of two Clio Awards and received one Emmy Award nomination. He was recognized as one of the top 70 cinematographers for the “On Film Kodak Salute Series.” He is the ONLY cinematographer who has literally been shooting continuously, around-the-clock for over 30 years.

From The Ted Talk – “Gratitude”

Did you know that 80 percentof the information we receive comes through our eyes?And if you compare light energy to musical scales,it would only be one octave that the naked eye could see,which is right in the middle?And aren’t we grateful for our brains that can, you know,take this electrical impulse that comes from light energyto create images in order for us to explore our world?And aren’t we grateful that we have heartsthat can feel these vibrationsin order for us to allow ourselves to feel the pleasureand the beauty of nature?

Nature’s beauty is a gift that cultivatesappreciation and gratitude. So I have a gift I want to share with you today,a project I’m working on called Happiness Revealed,and it’ll give us a glimpse into that perspectivefrom the point of view of a child and an elderly manof that world.

Child: When I watch TV,it’s just some shows that you just — that are pretend,and when you explore, you getmore imagination than you already had,and when you get more imagination,it makes you want to go deeper inso you can get more and see beautifuler things,like the path, if it’s a path, it could lead you to a beach,or something, and it could be beautiful.

Elderly Man: You think this is just another day in your life?It’s not just another day. It’s the one day that is given to youtoday.It’s given to you. It’s a gift.It’s the only gift that you have right now,and the only appropriate responseis gratefulness.If you do nothing else but to cultivate that responseto the great gift that this unique day is,if you learn to respondas if it were the first day in your lifeand the very last day,then you will have spent this day very well.

Begin by opening your eyes and be surprisedthat you have eyes you can open,that incredible array of colors that is constantly offered to usfor pure enjoyment.Look at the sky.We so rarely look at the sky.We so rarely note how different it isfrom moment to moment, with clouds coming and going.We just think of the weather,and even with the weather, we don’t think ofall the many nuances of weather.We just think of good weather and bad weather.This day, right now, has unique weather,maybe a kind that will never exactlyin that form come again.That formation of clouds in the sky will never be the sameas it is right now.Open your eyes. Look at that.

Look at the faces of people whom you meet.Each one has an incredible story behind their face,a story that you could never fully fathom,not only their own story, but the story of their ancestors.We all go back so far,and in this present moment, on this day,all the people you meet, all that life from generationsand from so many places all over the worldflows together and meets you herelike a life-giving water, if you only open your heart and drink.

Open your heart to the incredible gifts that civilizationgives to us.You flip a switch and there is electric light.You turn a faucet and there is warm water and cold water,and drinkable water.It’s a gift that millions and millions in the worldwill never experience.

Native American Indians Butterfly Facts

Due to the natural beauty of its wings, the butterfly is often considered vain. Yet, in Navajo mythology, the butterfly brings the sacred flint to the hooves of the horse. In the legend of the deity, “Butterfly Boy” was cured of his vanity by being struck by an axe by Rain Boy on the head. His wounded head cracked opened and out of it came all the butterflies of the world. The perishable dust of butterfly’s wings is sometimes thought to prove that such beauty is usually not durable. A corollary: In Navajo belief, the butterfly’s origin is the caterpillar, sacred because of his ability to transform into butterfly. However, while butterfly may not always be trusted because of their vanity, caterpillar is a simple, many-footed walker through life. He may give advice to his “betters.” (In other words the caterpillar does the work, the butterfly is just a creation of beauty that does not last long.)

Youtube, I created this for today’s post.(Eric Clapton’s rather sweet song ~ In the sun, the rain, the snow, Love is lovely, let it grow.) enjoy! 🙂

I believe I can never reach spiritual bliss – “anand”- without a deep understanding of the ‘Divine feminine’. The Divine Feminine has been put on the back burner for eons now. We’ve swept her away, like dust under the carpet. Yet, the Sacred Feminine requires all of us to come into acceptance of ourselves as we exist and breathe in Our Mother. In as much as we are able to realize that we are her daughters and sons, we realize we are becoming her. She has been and is known by many names and by no name at all. In many cultures and within our own intuitive heart centers, she abides. For most of us, our love of her knows no bounds and is teeming with gratefulness for her many gifts, she has given us and continues to impart to us on a daily basis. Both sacred and mundane, she reminds us that nothing is separate or apart from her, because absolutely everything is in her. This divine feminine is compassionate, courageous, and humble. She is not reigned over by the five vices – lust, anger, greed, emotional attachment, and ego – but is in control of them. She already exists in men and women, but now we need to tap into her universal femininity.

I often use flowers as a way of connecting with the Inner Feminine, for her spirit is very much in nature. The flower garden is a constant reminder of how bountiful and Sacred She is.

The feminine is the matrix of creation. This truth is something profound and elemental, and every woman knows it in the cells of her body, in her instinctual depths. Out of the substance of her very being life comes forth. She can conceive and give birth, participate in the greatest mystery of bringing a soul into life. And yet we have forgotten, or been denied, the depths of this mystery, of how the divine light of the soul creates a body in the womb of a woman, and how the mother shares in this wonder, giving her own blood, her own body, to what will be born. Our culture’s focus on a disembodied, transcendent God has left women bereft, denying them the sacredness of this simple mystery of divine love.

What we do not realize is that this patriarchal denial affects not only every woman, but also life itself. When we deny the divine mystery of the feminine we also deny something fundamental to life. We separate life from its sacred core, from the matrix that nourishes all of creation. We cut our world off from the source that alone can heal, nourish and transform it. The same sacred source that gave birth to each of us is needed to give meaning to our life, to nourish it with what is real, and to reveal to us the mystery, the divine purpose to being alive.

Because humanity has a central function in the whole of creation, what we deny to ourself we deny to all of life. In denying the feminine her sacred power and purpose we have impoverished life in ways we do not understand. We have denied life its sacred source of meaning and divine purpose, which was understood by the ancient priestesses. We may think that their fertility rites and other ceremonies belonged only to the need for procreation or a successful harvest. In our contemporary culture we cannot understand how a deeper mystery was enacted, one that consciously connected life to its source in the inner worlds, a source that held the wholeness of life as an embodiment of the divine, allowing the wonder of the divine to be present in every moment.

The days of the priestesses, their temples and ceremonies are over, and because the wisdom of the feminine was not written down but transmitted orally (logos is a masculine principle), this sacred knowledge is lost. We cannot reclaim the past, but we can witness a world without her presence, a world which we exploit for greed and power, which we rape and pollute without real concern. And then we can begin the work of welcoming her back, of reconnecting with the divine that is at the core of creation, and learning once again how to work with the sacred principles of life. Without the intercession of the divine feminine we will remain in this physical and spiritual wasteland we have created, passing on to our children a diseased and desecrated world.

The choice is simple. Can we remember the wholeness that is within us, the wholeness that unites spirit and matter? Or will we continue walking down this road that has abandoned the divine feminine, that has cut women off from their sacred power and knowledge? If we choose the former we can begin to reclaim the world, not with masculine plans, but with the wisdom of the feminine, the wisdom that belongs to life itself. If we choose the latter we may attempt some surface solutions with new technology. We may combat global warming and pollution with scientific plans. But there will be no real change. A world that is not connected to its soul cannot heal. Without the participation of the divine feminine nothing new can be born.

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A brief post from the Masterful Don Miguel Ruiz, called the “Dream Of The Planet” – a follow-on from my last post “Every Human Is An Artist,” (Prayers – A Communion With Our Creator) blogged from a month ago, and posted on June 22, 2014 . I hope some of you will remember it...

I thought I’d offer another excerpt from “Prayers – A Communion With Our Creator“, as this little book is just crammed full of gems of wisdom and other truths. All prayer is a communion of the human with the divine. Whether prayers are offered in love or gratitude and inspiration, or from fear, despair, or desperation, we talk heart-to-heart with divine spirit. When we don’t pray, and I must say, I don’t pray as often as I used to, we feel more alone, cut off from our own hearts, and our own power. When I don’t pray, I write posts like this, because positive writing is a prayer, it is an agreement between the heart and the divine, an investment in faith, and helps foster the intent.

~ Thank you, eve

…“Together with my new post is kwisital,s eye-catching you tube, “AWAKENING INTO INFINITE LOVE AND LIGHT.” Kwisital is a French guy with a deft hand with both music and film, he creates pretty amazing you tubes often using English quotations. I love his imagery and his creativity, use of color and sound. I hope you will take two or three minutes to watch his you tube.

The dream of the planet is the dream of all humans together. We can call it society, we can call it a nation, but the result of the creation of the mind, individual and collective, is a dream. The dream can be a pleasant dream that we call heaven or it can be a nightmare, that we call hell. But heaven and hell only exist at the level of the mind.

The human society, the dream of the planet is ruled by lies, and fear is the result. It is a dream where humans judge one another, find one another guilty, and punish one another. Humans use the power of the word to gossip and to hurt one another. Misuse of the word creates emotional poison, and all the emotional poison is in the dream. It goes around the world, and that is what most humans eat: “emotional poison.” The dream of the planet prepares newborn humans to believe what it wants them to believe. In that dream, there is no justice; there is only injustice. Nothing is perfect; there is only imperfection. That is why humans eternally search for justice, for happiness, and for love.

For thousands of years people have believe there is a conflict between good and evil in the universe. But this is not true. The real conflicts is between truth and what is not truth. The conflict exists in the human mind, not in the rest of nature. Good and evil are the result of that conflict. Believing in truth results in goodness; believing in and defending what is not truth results in evil. Evil is just the result of believing in lies.

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Perhaps one of the most beautiful You Tubes I’ve seen. A must see for all women.

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Celebrating the unacknowledged and unappreciated life of women in our modern material analytical ego-boosting culture, recognizing her unseen essence and under valued contribution in nourishing and upholding the very fabric and foundation of life and civilization in the planet as the mothers of the human race. The purpose is not to put women in a higher pedestal nor to emasculate men, but to arrive at a deeper understanding of the male-female evolution and gender communication at all levels.

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image from Beauty of The Arts, a Facebook page.

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Women are the makers of the home, the nation and the world. – Sai Baba

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Divine Personage of Anadamayi Ma – Life Summary

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Experience of Sublime Holiness

It was a cold evening in December 1924, when I was taken to Shahbag for darshan of the Mother by Rai Bahadur Pran Gopal Muhkerjee. We were taken straight to the room where Mother was sitting alone deeply absorbed in meditation. A dim lamp was burning in front of her and that was perhaps the only thing in the room. Mother’s face was completely hidden from our view, as in those days she used a veil exactly like a newly married village girl. After we had waited there for about half an hour, suddenly the veil loosened itself and Mother’s face became visible in all its brilliance and lustre. Hymns containing many veeja-mantras (sound symbols) began to be recited by the Mother in uncommon accents, producing wonderful resonance, which affected the whole surrounding. The stillness of the cold December night, the loneliness of the Shahbag gardens and, above all, the sublimity and serenity of the atmosphere in the Mother’s room – all combined to produce a sense of holiness which could be distinctly felt. As long as we were in the room we felt an indescribable elevation of the spirit, a silence and a depth not previously experienced, a peace that passeth all understanding. We came away from Shahbag late at night with the conviction that we had been in the presence of a superior being whom it is difficult to doubt or deny.

From the book: Mother as Seen by Her Devotees as told by Dr Nalini Kanta Brahma, Professor of Philosophy, Presidency College, Calcutta “To believe in Him under any particular form is not enough. Accept Him in His numberless forms, shapes and modes of being, in everything that exists. Aim at the whole and all your actions will be whole.”

Anandamayi Ma, Cry Only For Him

In the summer of 1948, a lady from South India had come to Kishenpur with a party from Hrishikesh. Seemingly absentminded and obviously distressed, she told Ma: “First my husband passed away. I was upset but I could bear it, because I had my only daughter, a lovely talented child. When she was 12, she fell ill and died. Since then I cannot find peace of mind. She was all I had, so beautiful and promising. When she had hardly begun her life, she was torn away from me. Why did she leave me? I cannot understand. For some time I worked in an orphanage. I thought, if I have no child, let me at least serve motherless children. I got attached to these children and they to me. But my heart is still broken. My guru said: ‘Continue your sadhana’. But I cannot concentrate. All the time I am pining for my darling. Nothing appeals to me. I want my child back. What am I to do?”

Ma: “First of all, sorrow comes from the sense of ‘I’ and ‘mine’. You say: ‘My daughter died’, and so you grieve. But who are you? Find out who you are! She was the fruit of your body. As long as you are identified with the body, there must be pain. It is inevitable. So many boys and girls die, young and beautiful, yet it does not affect you deeply. You only think this one child was your own and you have lost her.”

“Then there is another thing to be learnt – all sorrow is due to the fact that one keeps apart from God. When you are with Him, all pain disappears. Let your thoughts dwell on Him. Remember that your daughter is now with Him. The more you think of God, the nearer you will be to her. If you must shed tears, cry for Him.”

“Just as some blossoms fall off without bearing fruit, so do some human beings die young. For a while God had entrusted the child to your care and then He took her back unto Himself. Now He Himself is looking after her. One day you will go there too. Until then keep your mind on God and you will also be with your child.”

“How do you know that your child is not much better off where she is now? How much trouble and distress life has brought you! Would you have desired a similar fate for her?”

“Then again, on the level where there is only one Self, there is no question of birth and death. Who is born? Who dies? All is one Self”

“The same mind that identifies itself with the body can be turned towards the Eternal and then the pain the body experiences will be a matter of indifference. Since the body is bound to get hurt at times, there must be suffering as long as one is identified with it. This world oscillates endlessly between pleasure and pain; there can be no security, no stability here. These are to be found in God alone. How can there be both, the world and the One? On the way there seem to be two, God and the world, but when the Goal has been reached, there is only One. What worldly life is you have seen. Who is yours? Only your Guru, your Ishta (chosen deity); in Him you will find everything and everyone. “I am your child”.

Several months later the same lady came to Varanasi for Ma’s darshan. She looked younger and happier. “I have gotten over my grief,” she said “I am now reconciled to my fate. When Ma said ‘I am your child’, her voice was my daughter’s voice. My hair stood on end and I had a wonderful feeling which I cannot describe in words. From that moment the wound in my heart began to heal. I have gained an inner conviction that my child is happy where she is. I am finding peace and am able to attend to my meditation. Now I am planning to go on a pilgrimage to Badri and Kedarnath. I only wish all bereaved mothers could be comforted as I have been”

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Just finished and polished a new you tube with many beautiful Sri Sai Baba photos edited in painterly style.. I do hope you will take 5 minutes of your time to view this nostalgic you tube, created with all of my heartfelt feeling… just saying. 🙂 The quotations on the you tube are:

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When you realise the Self, then there is no separate individual. You can think of individuals as different light bulbs. There will be differences in wattage. There will be differences in age, in colour, in form, in name. One is a tube light and another is a bulb light. There will be differences in shape, but everywhere the current that powers them is the same. That current is you. You are not a bulb which appears different from any other bulb. You are the current, the one current that is found in all the bulbs. That is who you are. – Sai Baba

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“Do not be misled by what you see around you, or be influenced by what you see. You live in a world which is a playground of illusion, full of false paths, false values and false ideals. But you are not part of that world.”

~ Sathya Sai Baba

When a person asserts that he is low and mean and that he knows but little, he becomes low and mean and his knowledge shrinks.We become what we believe we are. We are children of Almighty God, endowed with Supreme, Power, Glory and Wisdom.We are children of Immortality.When we dwell in this thought, how can we ever be low and ignorant?

Eve

Hello, to All People Everywhere, This blog is an on-going adventure in all things with a spiritual dint - and there are my photographs too. I must confess to photographing flowers macro style because they are such a delightful subject and not at all camera shy. Both have given me a great deal of pleasure and some pain over the years.
Eve